Awake Unto Me (11 page)

*

A controversy among the students’ mentors relieved the tedium of ward work. Dr. Grant and Nurse Sand had petitioned Superintendent Henry to allow the first-year students some time working in the men’s wards. Only second-year students were permitted to work there because of some vague moral tenet, i.e., first-years weren’t sufficiently mature. Nurse Sand was the head nurse of the men’s ward, and she believed it would hasten the instruction of the students to care for male patients, who were more numerous and more variously afflicted. Dr. Grant concurred and the two of them were locked in polite battle with Superintendent Henry.

“It’s not proper!” the superintendent asserted.

“Begging your pardon, ma’am,” Nurse Sand said, glancing at Dr. Grant. “I do not see how it is a harm to advance this instruction one year. I believe the first-years are able to master the necessary detachment.”

“I do not want a gaggle of giggling girls performing this procedure with our poor patients.”

Dr. Grant cleared his throat and Superintendent Henry gave him her full attention. She clearly resented any encroachment upon her sphere, especially her direction of nurses’ training, but she was nevertheless required to respect doctors at all times.

“Nurse Sand, Madam Superintendent. We are, at present, quite shorthanded in the men’s wards. We need to get some help for the number of patients who are currently in our care. It is the duty of the nurse to treat male patients. They are, to their nurses, like little children. The first-year students are a sober and alert bunch. I beg you to please reconsider.”

“Very well,” she said with a sigh, obviously defeated. She stomped down the hallway in her flat nursing shoes, her ankles jiggling under the bunched material of her cotton stockings. Dr. Addison and Nurse Sand nodded at the nursing students to continue their work and walked away, speaking to one another quietly.

“I wasn’t allowed to care for any men other than to give medication until I was a second-year. I don’t see why you firsties are being allowed.” The second-year student, Nurse Matthews, was speaking to Beth, Virginia, and their classmate Rebecca over the still body of a male patient the following day.

“Let’s get on with it then,” Virginia said acerbically. “It’s not going to get any better for the patient the longer we delay.” They were gathered around the patient’s bed. He was in for an appendectomy and had been given chloroform. At that moment, he was out cold.

“I don’t think he’s going to feel it,” Beth observed.

“You don’t know that,” Rebecca said. She was wide-eyed and reminded Beth of a field mouse.

“Quiet!” Matthews ordered. “To insert a catheter, you must be quick but gentle.”

They grew quiet as Nurse Reynolds showed them how to lubricate the tip with petrolatum.

She lowered the patient’s cover and lifted his gown. They were dead quiet. Rebecca did look as though she would burst into giggles at any moment, but Matthews fixed her with a look.

“What did you think?” Virginia asked her afterward. Beth narrowed her eyes, not understanding the question.

“About, you
know
. Most women don’t get their first look until they get married. Unless they’re fallen women. We’ll be handling them routinely.” She shook her head in amazement.

Beth shrugged. “It’s of no consequence except that we’re to take care of more patients. That can only be good. Don’t you think?”

*

Near the end of her second year, Beth nearly got dismissed, not for being incompetent, but for being too competent.

She was in the typhoid ward under Dr. Grant. The head nurse of the ward was Nurse Smith. She was sugary to the patients, obsequious to the doctors, and a holy terror to her underlings. She wasn’t terribly bright either, but she took orders well until they received a patient who was uncommonly charming and handsome. He had never had any problems until he got typhoid, and he was well on the mend. Dr. Grant issued his usual order though—broth only for another thirty-six hours. Solid food too quickly could rupture a typhoid patient’s gut and kill him.

Their patient, Mr. Simms, was wheedling Nurse Smith unmercifully, and she seemed just as happy to go along with his flirting. Beth shook her head and turned away at his fourth request. Smith came over and Beth watched with horror as she fed him a large piece of bread and handed him more before returning to another patient. Beth went to him and put out her hand. “Spit it out.”

He rolled his eyes and tried to look innocent, swallowing quickly.

“That other one, she said it was fine.”

“Give it to me,” Beth said, evenly.

“I don’t know what you mean,” Simms said slyly. He caught sight of Nurse Smith.

“Nurse!” he called, and waved her over. “This nurse thinks I can’t have food.”

“Hammond. What are you about? I have seen to this patient. Go tend to the others.”

“Dr. Grant said no food yet. And—”

“Be quiet. It’s none of your concern.”

Beth was nonplussed. She knew Nurse Smith was countermanding the doctor’s orders and it was potentially dangerous, but she was the underling and Superintendent Henry was strict in her requirements that all observe the pecking order.
Well
,
she mentally shrugged,
if he doesn’t sicken, it’s not my business. Smith should know.

It so happened that Beth had night duty and it fell to her to summon the doctor to see to Simms. He had woken with gut pain.

“He had some bread earlier,” Beth reported dispassionately. “No, I do not know how he came by it.”

“Well, Nurse, I should think you would know by now what this means. We will have to take him to surgery and hope his intestine is not too badly damaged, causing him to die of peritonitis. Thanks to you.”

Beth opened her mouth and closed it again. It would do no good to start pointing fingers.

After Simms’s surgery, Dr. Grant came to find Beth, who sat quietly at the nurses’ desk sipping cold coffee and marking patient charts.

“Nurse Hammond. Simms will survive. We were able to patch the intestine after we removed the bread. No infection, I believe.”

“That is good to hear, Doctor.”

“I wager you did not commit the basely stupid act of giving him food? It would be entirely unlike you.”

Beth looked at him but said nothing.

“I am going to take it up with Superintendent Henry.”

“Doctor! Please. It’s not important. The patient will recover, you said.”

“Why in God’s name didn’t you say something, Nurse Hammond?” Addison spoke sharply.

Beth stared at her cold coffee, unwilling to be a tattletale.

“Never mind. I’ll deal with it myself.” He stalked off and Beth watched him with trepidation. Sighing, she got to her feet and went to check on patients.

“You needn’t have told her, you know,” Smith hissed into Beth’s ear later as Beth was trying to get a little sleep before the day shift began.

Beth was unable to sleep as it was. She sat up and straightened her clothes and looked Nurse Smith in the eye. “I didn’t tell her, Nurse Smith. Dr. Grant told her.”

“But it’s none of your business.”

“I agree, but since we’re speaking of it, you let him take the food and you knew it was risky. So it’s not my fault if Superintendent Henry is displeased with you. I didn’t tell her though.”

The superintendent reprimanded Beth for both allowing the patient to eat and for contradicting her senior nurse. If I’m ever in charge of a ward, I’m going to treat my employees with a lot more care, Beth thought. I’d prefer private service if this is what it’s like.

Private service, she knew, was more common than ward work. The hospital made money from sending its nurses to the homes of the wealthy, who could afford not to have to go to the hospital. Beth was never sent, probably because Dr. Grant deplored exploitation of student nurses. He also always requested her for his cases. It was, she thought, one very handy outgrowth of the preeminence of the doctors, if the doctor in question was Addison Grant.

Beth sat with the rest of her class listening to Dr. Grant’s final lecture on bacteriology. It was eight o’clock in the evening. They had spent a ten-hour day on the wards already, with only a couple of meal breaks. It was, Beth reflected, a clear indication of what the school thought was important: eleven hours with patients and one hour learning medicine.

She stifled a yawn and tried again to get comfortable in the hard wooden chair. She wished she had more energy for the medical lectures, which were fascinating. The priorities were so rigid, however, that the staff nurses thought nothing of pulling a student out of a lecture to care for a patient if they deemed it necessary or were too lazy to do it themselves.

Unlike most of the other doctors, Dr. Grant didn’t behave as though it was beneath him to teach student nurses. As an expert in infectious diseases he took them into the disease wards to discuss the symptoms of each illness, just as he would medical students. Most of the girls loved him for his smile and his wavy brown hair. He always came out on top when they discussed the doctors. Unmoved by the others’ glowing praise of his appearance, Beth very much appreciated the way he treated them.

Addison cleared his throat. He stood still, looking into the middle distance. “I think, before we dive into our last lecture on
Clostridium tetani
, I would like to take a few moments to share some thoughts with you. Your superintendent may say my sentiments would properly be communicated by her and I have no wish to supersede her, but let me add my voice in support of her exhortations to you.”

He paused, then, making eye contact with the students. “In two weeks you will graduate, armed, I believe, with sufficient technical knowledge. But what is most important, what will serve you best in the course of your careers, is not something I can impart to you. I would venture to say that most of you will not make nursing your life’s work. You will marry and raise families. But some of you, I hope, will persevere, and I speak to those of you who will take that path of a lifelong profession. Some might compare it to the calling of the church, since many of your predecessors were sisters, but I want to distinguish between a calling and a profession. The time is coming when a woman will not be considered odd or out of place if she pursues a profession such as nursing or even medicine. Do not tell Superintendent Henry I told you, but two of my classmates at the University of California were of the fairer sex and did very well.” He scanned the class and focused on Beth.

“Nurses must be professional. Oh, I know, it is professional to receive money for one’s labors, but it is much more than that. The field hand and the carpenter receive money for their work as well. But that work, however important—and I heartily agree, honest toil is important—does not attain the status of a profession. As nurses, you work with your hands as well as your heart, but you must also work with your minds. Without those three parts operating in harmony and without consistent integrity, responsibility, and attention, you will not be fulfilling your calling, so to speak, or your profession. Character is what I refer to, ladies. Nurses must be of the highest character, if for no other reason than to be able to endure the egomania of doctors.”

After waiting for their laughter to subside, he said, “The character of a nurse must be unimpeachable and her ethics and morals without question. I realize we have all endeavored to convey this to you in many ways, but I wished to make it explicit. But I will not take up any more of your time. Shall we proceed with our final subject?”

And with that, he began his lecture.

At the conclusion of the hour, Addison said, “Before you go—formal invitations will be forthcoming—but I wish to personally invite you to a farewell reception at my home next Friday evening.”

Afterward, Beth approached Addison at his lectern. “Ah, Nurse Hammond. What can I do for you?”

“Dr. Grant. I was wondering…?”

“Yes, I was addressing those comments to you.”

Beth was stunned. Did he really think she was lacking in morals or ethics? Or that she would be one of those who would marry and give up the profession? Her stomach dropped and she felt slightly faint.

“Ms. Hammond?”

“I only, um, wished to know if you could provide me with a recommendation when I apply for a post.”

“With the utmost pleasure, Nurse Hammond. I would be honored. You are by far one of the best students.”

“Thank you, Doctor.” She nodded and walked away, confusion and relief warring in her mind.

*

Kerry and Laura predictably clashed over the food for Addison’s reception.

When Kerry proposed the menu—cold honeyed ham, potato salad, and several cakes and pies—Laura said, “This isn’t dinner bell for cowboys on a wagon train. I would rather we have tea sandwiches and petit fours.”

“People’ll be hungry,” Kerry said. “We need to set out a good bit of food. No one ought to go away hungry from a party.”

Laura flounced off to talk to Addison, who was in his office absorbed in a medical text. After she told him her trouble, he leaned back and pinched the bridge of his nose as though he had a headache. The squabbles never ended. Laura came to him nearly every day. She would agree to his entreaties to attempt to get along but would still find some reason to complain, though Kerry never said a word to him. He cursed his good nature and his inability to be a stern husband and discipline his household. He hated the conflict between his wife and the strange but oddly compelling young woman whom he felt bound to protect, but he felt powerless to stop it. He had hoped it would subside over time, but if anything it had gotten worse as Kerry grew older.